Germany and Its Gypsies

A Post-Auschwitz Ordeal

Gilad Margalit

Publication Year: 2002

Historian Gilad Margalit eloquently fills a tragic gap in the historical record with this sweeping examination of the plight of Gypsies in Germany before, during, and since the era of the Third Reich.Germany and Its Gypsies reveals the painful record of the official treatment of the German Gypsies, a people whose future, in the shadow of Auschwitz, remains uncertain. Margalit follows the story from the heightened racism of the nineteenth century to the National Socialist genocidal policies that resulted in the murder of most German Gypsies, from the shifting attitudes in the two Germanys in 1945 through reunification and up to the present day. Drawing upon a rich variety of sources, Margalit considers the pivotal historic events, legal arguments, debates, and changing attitudes toward the status of the German Gypsies and shines a vitally important light upon the issue of ethnic groups and their victimization in society. The result is a powerful and unforgettable testament.

Cover

Frontmatter

Contents

Illustrations

Preface and Acknowledgments

On 9 January 1957, less than twelve years after the end of the Nazi persecution
of the Gypsies, the Administration and Construction Committee
of the local parliament (Landtag) of the German state of Baden-
Wurttemberg debated a bill for...

1. Images and Impressions of Gypsies in the German Collective Memory

The sinti (also written and pronounced Sinte and Cinti) arrived
in the German domain of Europe in the fifteenth century. To this
day, they are the largest group of Gypsies in Germany. They call
themselves “Gadschkene Sinti,” which means German Sinti. After 1870,
other Gypsy groups emigrated

2. Policy toward Gypsies until the Collapse of the Third Reich

Groups of Gypsies first arrived in the German-speaking domain of
Europe at the beginning of the fifteenth century. Contemporary
chronicles report that these groups were headed by leaders bearing
aristocratic titles, who carried patronage letters (Schutzbriefe) from
Christian rulers. The patronage...

3. Policy toward Gypsies in the Shadow of Auschwitz

The Gypsy policy of the Nazi regime collapsed along with the
Third Reich in May 1945. The collective incarceration, enforced
sterilization, and mass murder came to an end, and the bodies
in the Reich’s criminal police office (RKPA), which had centralized the
persecution, were dismantled...

5. German Courts, Nazi Perpetrators, and Gypsy Victims

From the late 1940s to the mid-1960s, the legal system of the Federal
Republic of Germany (FRG) conducted an investigation into
issues related to the Nazi persecution of Gypsies, in particular, the
appeals for compensation by Gypsy survivors of Nazi persecution. In
dealing with these questions,

6. Effect of Nazism and Denazification on Attitudes toward Gypsies

The mass murder of Gypsies by the Nazis did not lead to any substantial
change in attitudes toward them by ordinary Germans
after 1945. Nor were the Allies’ military governments particularly
interested in the attitude of the German population toward Gypsies. The
denazification policy they established...

7. Public Debate on Nazi Persecution of Gypsies

The debate among Germans about the Gypsy persecution has focused
more on the motives of the Nazis than on the fate of the
victims. Opinion has been divided sharply between those who
share the Allies’ views and those whose views are more in line with the
defeated Nazis. The Allies, who...

8. “Discovery” of the Gypsy Victim of Nazism

Although a public discourse on the Nazi persecution of Gypsies
had begun in Germany in 1945, the issue was not properly placed
on the public agenda until March 1979, when the Society for the
Threatened Peoples (Gesellschaft fur bedrohte Volker), a German human
rights organization, initiated...

Epilogue

The confrontation between Joseph Vogt and Emmi Diemer-
Nicolaus in parliament in Stuttgart on 9 January 1957, which set
the opening scene of this book, is highly representative of the
German discourse on Gypsies in the aftermath of Auschwitz. Strange
as it might sound, each speaker,...

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